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H62t cop.2 HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY
THIS IS WASHINGTON COUNTY
(1968)
LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
Q.277. 288
CTP.2
HLINGIS #HISTORICAL SURVEY
THIS IS WASHINGTON COUNTY
ILLINOIS 1968
1818
TENNIAL
SESQUICENTE
1818-1968
THIS IS WASHINGTON COUNTY (Its First 150 Years - 1818-1968)
Published by the Sesquicentennial Committee of the Historical Society of Washington County, Illinois
GROVER BRINKMAN, Editor
VENICE BRINK, Co-Editor
LAWRENCE HOOD, Co-Editor PAUL SACHTLEBEN, Co-Editor DAVID WATTS, Co-Editor
Appreciation : The editors wish to take the opportunity to sincerely thank the many, many people who have helped compile this book. You have all been wonderful, with your time, help, suggestions, contributions. We thank each and every one of you!
The perfect history is yet to be written. An editor cannot trust to myths, le- gends, or traditions, but must rely on facts. There are instances when even facts are clouded and obscure. All that remains is conjecture.
In compiling this book research has been as thorough as conditions and time warrant. Oftentimes the facts are pinned down to the point of happening, true, authentic, statistical. But there are statements, dates, names, that are not this factual. The editors have sifted through yellowed papers, old records, for long, long hours. Family trees, interviews with aged citizens, and vari- ous other sources have been resorted to, to bring you this compiliation of Washington County history that began long before record-keeping was the precise thing it is today. So if there are vague passages, debatable dates, or other inaccuracies, we beg your indulgence. The perfect.history, we'll re- peat, has never been written.
The Editors
IS 1968
NNIA
SE
3
Washington Countians Are Also "Egyptians"
There is no question that Washington County is part of that symbolical area of southern Illinois called "Egypt." The name, used as early as 1843. is voiced with pride by most southern Illinoisans, but in the northern part of the state, it is somehow looked down upon, as our own personal Appalachia.
The exact boundaries of Egypt are in dispute. But most southern Illinoisans will settle for that part of the state lying south of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, which runs east from St. Louis, Mo. to Vincennes, Ind.
Figuratively, Egypt would be the southernmost quarter of the state, that hilly, coal-mine-eroded region that is also rich in history. People are friendly in this grassroots society.
Perhaps the origin of the name will always re- main a puzzle. There are as many as four versions:
Egypt takes its name from the location of such old world cities as Cairo, Memphis, Thebes, Palestine and Karnak.
The area bears a marked resemblance to the Nile's delta.
The name originated in the folklore and illiteracy of the inhabitants, or possibly because at one time southern Illinois supplied corn to the rest of the state during a severe crop blight, playing good Samaritan to much of the upstate.
A clash of dates discredits the first reason entire- ly. Cairo was not established until 1837, Thebes until 1844 (even then it was known as Sparrhawk's Land- ing). Karnak also is far from a "very old" town. Alle- gation to the word, Egypt, appears as early as 1843, long before the influx of settlers at any of these places.
Point two: Alleged similiarity between southern Illinois and the Nile's delta is totally absurd! The Nile delta is at least 150 miles long, 120 miles wide. The alluvial "tip" of southern Illinois called Egypt extends for only 25 or 30 miles northward from Birds' Point at Cairo, the junction of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. The rest of the area ( northward) is rugged, hilly, an outcropping of the Missouri-Arkansas Ozark chain of hogback hills, and bears no resemblance to the Delta country.
Point Three: No southern Illinoisan will permit the allegation that the name originated from "the intel- lectual darkness" of the inhabitants, or the folklore of
a backwoods area. Southern Illinois had institution of learning well in advance of northern Illinois. For in- stance, John Mason Peck founded his Rock Spring Seminary near Belleville in 1827. Four years later it moved to the Alton community to become Shurtleff College. McKendree College, aged Methodist institu- tion of learning at Lebanon, was established in 1828. Vandalia had the first historical society in the state. We were not as "backwoodsy" as some would have us believe!
John W. Allen of Carbondale, southern Illinois' dean of historians, writing in the Chicago Schools Journal in 1955, cited earlier and more detailed testi- mony. Allen's source was A. D. Duff, prominent lawyer and judge of southern Illinois, who contributed an article on the origin of Egypt to the Shawneetown Ga- zette in the 1860's. According to Duff, the very long and severe winter of the "deep snow," (1830-31), de- layed planting. The following summer was cool, and a killing frost came early in September. The corn crop in central Illinois was a complete failure. The settlers needed corn for feed, for seed, and for the corn-bread that was staple fare. They resorted to the southern part of the state, where the crop had matured. As a boy liv- ing on a main road in Bond County, Duff said that in the Spring of 1832 he saw many wagons coming south empty and going back loaded with corn. These people were Bible readers, and were reminded of the sons of Jacob resorting to Egypt for grain.
The Biblical reference is to the famine that struck the Mediterranean world while the tribe of Jacob re- sided in Canaan. Hearing of their plight, Jacob's son, Joseph. who held a high place in Pharaoh's court, sent money and raiment and "ten asses laden with the good things of Egypt, and ten she-asses laden with corn and bread and meat," so Jacob could lead his people to Egypt and eat "the fat of the land." If you care to check, you'll find all of this related in chapter 45 of the Book of Genesis in your Bible.
The baleful effects of the winter of 1830-31 in all but southern Illinois is a matter of historical record. Whether or not you accept the above as an explanation as to why Washington Countians live in Egypt (with- out the pyramids ), please don't say "Little Egypt." Little Egypt was a fiery belly-dancer at the World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago, and has no refer- ence to the geographical Egypt of which southern Illinoisans are justly proud.
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. lassisSin ILLINOIS
Springfield C
IND.
PALESTINE NEW MEMPHIS/
MO.
NEW PALESTINE
KARNAK
THEBES Q
KY.
CAIRO
‹EGYPT, USA
There is a "new face" in Illinois today, and it is found in Egypt, of which Wash- ington County is a part. One of the finest shrines in America is the Bald Knob Cross at Alto Pass, shown here.
5
Washington County as a Territory
Today most of us think of our home county in terms of the present, as it is today, but turning back the pages of the history books, Washington County has quite a longevity record. For instance:
1673 - Claimed as a French possession under military rule.
1721 - Civil administration as part of French Louisiana.
1763 - British sovereignty, part of the Western Wilderness Territory, military rule.
1774 - British military rule, Province of Quebec.
1778 - July 4 - Proclaimed part of Illinois Country of Virginia, civil and military authorities appointed by Gov. Patrick Henry.
1773 - Ceded by Virginia to the thirteen colonies in common, still unorganized territory.
1787 - Part of St. Clair County, Northwest Territory of the Confed- erated American States, Gen. Arthur St. Clair, Governor.
1795 - Mostly part of Randolph County, a small part of St. Clair County, Indiana Territory, U.S.A.
1800 - Part of St. Clair County, Illinois Territory.
1818 - Made a separate county of State (Washington), including all of Clinton County, Illinois.
1824 - December 23 - Clinton County separated, and Washington County began its existence in its present form.
OCTAGONAL ODDITY IN THE COUNTY
Southern Illinois has several round ( or octagonal ) buildings of more or less fame, including Randolph County's historie octagonal schoolhouse, and a round barn in Marion County near Kell that onee was used as a marker in early-day aviation. But perhaps the most unusual of all is the old octagonal house on the out- skirts of Richview. As this is written, it was ready to be razed; perhaps by the time this sees print, it will be gone.
One could go quietly mad, tracing the intricacies of this old house. It has a somber, haunted look that no doubt would raise even the eritical eyebrows of Alfred Hitchcock, if he espied it.
The house is the only "round" residence in the area. It is believed to have been built in 1871 by a man named Cooper. If his neighbors thought the un- conventional builder had lost his marbles, they could have been right, for later he did commit suicide in the strange house he built.
It seems the original octagonal house was the idea of an eastern phrenologist. Orson Squire Fowler, back in 1854. Fowler pointed out to his erities that eight walls in the form of an octagon will enelose more space than four falls of the same length, at right angles, plus better ventilation and lighting.
It is known that the Richview house was closely patterned after Fowler's ideas, even to the solid outside walls which were originally to have been covered with stucco. At one time the house also had a two-story porclı.
One interesting feature of this octagonal house plan was that one could enter any room with or with- out the use of the center hall. Upstairs. the four main rooms were narrowed somewhat. to make the two tri- angular rooms larger.
A full, deep fieldstone cellar was under the house, and neighbors said it at one time served as a garage for the owner's one-cylinder Reo automobile, one of the first horseless carriages in Richview.
Back in the gingerbread era of Fowler's day, he was listed as a spellbinding crackpot who also wrote a book, "Sexual Science," a frank marriage manual of no less than 930 pages that really lifted the roof off the literary world at that time for its frankness. Putting into practice his theories on promoting sexual vigor, Fowler married three times, fathering three children when he was past 70.
nul
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Washington County's only "round" house, once the pride of Richview.
It's a bit sad to think that such an area monument to architectural genius is going the way of all old houses, but such is the case. There is no incentive to restore it.
If ever a house had an "eight-sided rumpus room," this was it!
7
THE TURBULENT TWENTIES
The violent chapter in American lawlessness that in- duced author Paul M. Angle to write his sensational best- seller, "Bloody Williamson," a true, painstakingly research- ed saga of southern Illinois violence, did not entirely escape Washington County in spewing its death and mayhem.
A front page story in the St. Louis Globe Democrat, dated May 22, 1924, tells in detail of the ambush of Ku Klux Klan chief. S. Glenn Young and his wife, enroute to East St. Louis in the big Lincoln car that had become almost as well known as he was.
As he entered the lonely road through the Kaskaskia bottoms, west of Venedy Station, a Dodge that had been following him started to pass on the left. When it drew abreast. its occupants poured a volley of shots into the Lincoln. Mrs. Young slumped forward. Young skidded to a stop and jumped from the car attempting to fire at the speeding Dodge. Instead, he collapsed. He had been hit in the knee, and one leg was useless. In a short time a passing motorist found the wounded couple and took Mrs. Young to St. Elizabeth's Hospital at Belleville. Young followed in his car, with an unnamed man driving. Mrs. Young. hit in the face by shotgun pellets, lost the sight of one eye. Young had a shattered knee.
The second violence in Washington County. came to public attention on the morning of February 5, 1927. when a farmer walking across a field near DuBois, inside Wash- ington County borders, came across a partly clothed body. Several bullet holes were visible. The man was Lory Price, state highway patrolman. Later the body of the patrolman's wife, Ethel Price, was found in an abandoned mine shaft.
This violence, in and so near our county borders, was the result of an era of lawlessness that started in the William- son County coal field, back in September, 1921, when the Southern Illinois Coal Company opened a strip mine there. A miners' strike, and the importation of strike breakers re- sulted in the Herrin Massacre on June 22. 1922, when nine- teen men were killed and one fatally wounded.
On May 20. 1923, the Ku Klux Klan made its first public appearance at Marion. A gathering of 2000 Klans- men. initiated two hundred candidates at a ceremony held in a nearby field. On November 1, 1923, S. Glenn Young, hired by the Klan to take charge of its law-enforcement pro- gram in southern Illinois, arrived in Williamson County. Bootlegging raids started. with more violence, pistol-
whippings and death, with new hoodlum faces on the scene almost daily. A gang war was soon underway, with such familiar names as Art Newman, Charlie Birger, the machine- gun-toting Young. and dozens of others making the head- lines as violence erupted over a wide area.
Armed men, bombings, killings, roadhouse raids, gang against gang, turned Herrin and Marion into armed camps. Joe Adams, mayor of nearby West City, was murdered. Shady Rest, a hangout for the Birger gang. was bombed. Four bodies were found in the ruins. Carl. Earl and Bernie Shelton were sentenced to 25 years in the federal peniten- tiary for mail robbery.
Charlie Birger was arrested and charged with the mur- der of Mayor Joe Adams. With Art Newman and Ray Hy- land, Birger's trial opened at Benton on July 6. 1927. The jury found the three defendants guilty and decreed death for Birger, life imprisonment for Newman and Hyland. Bir- ger's hanging was delayed by a stay of execution by the Supreme Court. On October 21, 1927, another hoodlum named Rado Millich was hanged in the jailyard at Marion.
The Supreme Court denied Birger's appeal for a new trial. The Illinois Board of Pardons and Paroles refused to intercede as well. Birger. accordingly, was hanged in the jail- yard at Benton on April 19, 1928. Looking up at the sky the budding trees. his last words were. "It's a beautiful world."
Conclusion: S. Glenn Young and three of his henchmen were killed in a gunfight at Herrin on January 24, 1925. Carl Shelton was killed on his farm near Fairfield on Octo- ber 23, 1947. Connie Ritter died in the Menard penitentiary on January 6, 19-18. Bernie Shelton was killed in front of his tavern, near Peoria, on July 26, 1948. Earl Shelton was shot but recovered. On June 7, 1950, Roy Shelton was shot to death on his tractor at his Wayne County Farm. A score of lesser hoodlums met their death before the carnage ended.
The depression that followed the stock market crash of 1929 accelerated the reign of terror. already under way, in Williamson County. It lasted for more than twenty-five years.
With the exception of the two incidents mentioned above, Washington County escaped this feud and carnage. However, many a senior citizen here today remembers the many instances when Charlie Birger. S. Glenn Young. Art Newman, and later the Sheltons were seen inside county borders. perhaps eating lunch or having a car ser- viced at a county garage. The guns were there, but they were never used.
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Calamus Lake near Venedy, named after the Calamus lilies that grow here in prafusion, is Washington County's lowest spot.
HIGH AND LOW SPOT IN WASHINGTON COUNTY
When this writer was in his teens, and the road from Okawville to Nashville was dirt ( or mud) instead of con- crete, there is a distinct rememberance of the remains of an old coal mine on a slope midway between Addieville and the county seat. always pointed out as "highest spot in the county." This supposition is in error according to the Coast and Geodetic Survey, which goes to show that an image, planted long enough in the human brain, at last becomes "truth."
That government bureau noted for its factual accuracy in measuring the terrain of the United States, reveals that the highest spot in Washington County is near the Fairview Church. on the north edge of DuBois township, alongside Route 51, about three miles south of the Ashley Wye. The
elevation here is a fraction above 591 feet, according to a recent survey.
The second highest spot in the county is on the Harold Auld farm. west of Oakdale, where the elevation is 583 feet above sea level. The site is known as "Auld's Hill."
The lowest spot in the county is a body of water known as Calamus Lake, famous for its annual parade of lilies, located in the Kaskaskia Bottoms, about two miles southwest of Venedy Station. The elevation here is 395 feet.
We don't have any mountains in Washington County. as all natives well realize. but we do have a topography vari- ance of 196 feet, which is ample assurance that most of the rainfall in the county eventually drains into either the Kaskaskia or the Little Muddy Rivers.
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The Waad Tavern, shown here, was Nashville's most famous landmark, until it was razed in 1952, 130 years after it was built.
Wood Tavern at Nashville Was 1822 Hostelry
Without doubt many of the early records of Wash- ington County were lost in the fire that destroyed the courthouse in 1883, if indeed such records ever exist- ed. For instance, the only reliable history of Washing- ton County extant, published before that time, makes no mention at all of the old "Half-Way House," later known as the Wood Tavern, located on the old Shawneetown-St. Louis trace back when the city of Nashville was only a figment of the imagination in the minds of a bevy of terribly-agitated county commis- sioners. Yet the old tavern stood in the northwestern part of Nashville until 1952, when it was razed.
Nor does this same history volume mention-ex- cept in a fragmentary way-the owner and builder of the tavern, Major John D. Wood, one of the keenest, most enterprising businessmen in the county at that time. Today, Wood's tombstone lies neglected about a hundred feet west of where the old building stood.
The old Wood Tavern, until it was torn down 15 years ago, was believed to be one of the oldest public buildings in the county. if indeed not the oldest along the entire Shawneetown-St. Louis trace. It deserved a better fate than it got.
In the 1820's, and for about ten years afterward, the Shawneetown-St. Louis trace was the main east- west artery across the new state of Illinois. Its exact location in Nashville apparently is lost.
Suffice it is to say it was somewhere north of the Courthouse square, to eliminate the hill on which the business part of the city stands. This accounts for the location of the old tavern, about two blocks north of Route 460.
During that time it was the rendezvous and meet- ing place of politicians of every shade and leaning, of every party. for Wood was too keen a businessman to dip into the affairs of his guests.
It was said, but cannot be verified, that on one or two occasions during those four agonizing years with- out a courthouse, court was held within the walls of the tavern. It was the stopping place of circuit-riding lawyers and preachers, and of the riders of the pony express.
Dramatists have tried to weave into the story a bit of fiction that Abe Lincoln was a guest at the old Continued
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tavern one night. However, as far as this researcher can ascertain, there is little truth to the belief.
John D. Wood came to Washington County in 1821, in his twenty-first year. In common with most settlers of that period he "squatted" on a piece of government land, built his habitation, took his own sweet time about "proving up" on his holdings. Ac- cording to the available records he did not establish title until eleven years had passed.
In the meanwhile the inference is that the home
he built was a half-way house. probably in 1822 or 1823. He opened it up for business as soon as the roof was on. For a year or so he farmed as a sideline but gradually worked up a real estate business.
The next ten years were the golden age for the tavern. But when the surveyors laid out the city of Nashville, they evidently disregarded the old Shawnee- town trace's meanderings, placed the courthouse square at the top of the hill, and thus relegated the tavern to an ignominious end.
The Ice Cream Parlor
One might long lament the passing of the ice cream parlor. The present generation, and perhaps the generations to come, will never know its deep significance, the niche it cut into the life-pattern of people who now consider themselves approaching senior citizen status.
Today we have the dairy drive-ins. the malt shops, the quick-freeze emporiums, shops of a hundred vari- ations that serve ice cream. But none quite had the decor and the atmosphere of the ice cream parlor, circa of 1900 and thereafter.
The photo illustrating this bit of whimsy shows a typical ice cream parlor as today's senior citizens knew it in their youth. This one was operated by two brothers, the late John and Jules Faber in Okawville, who were known far and wide for the quality of their ice cream.
No French creams, mousses or spumone, just good old vanilla, strawberry and chocolate on occasions! The ten-cent chocolate soda in those days was compar- able to a thirty-cent malt today. An ice cream sundae was served in a silver shell, topped with fruit that was often home preserved.
Each town of any note had one or more ice cream parlors. Most of the establishments made their own ice cream. The freezer of the Faber Bros. was powered by a gasoline engine, and when its erratic "put-put-put" was heard downtown, everyone knew the brothers were making a fresh batch of ice cream.
There was no refrigeration in those days as we know it today. The freshly-frozen ice cream was pack- ed in vaults of ice. heavily salted to increase the freez- ing process. If you were in the ice cream business, yon "iced up" the cream at least once daily.
The furniture of the ice cream parlor had its own place in the Americana of the country, the wire-legged chairs and round tables having a distinction all of their own. Even today, the distinction remains, capitalized upon by the antique dealers who have cornered most of the existing furniture of that period.
What was once Faber Bros. Ice Cream Parlor at Okaw- ville is part of Seibert's Grocery today.
Then one day, something new was added to the ice cream world-the Eskimo Pie. Folks were amazed, especially the children. How had the ice cream been imprisoned inside its chocolate wrapper?
The ice cream parlor as grandfather knew it is gone. Perhaps it will return some day. under the guise of twentieth century technocracy. But whether it does or does not. it wrote a glorious chapter all over the land as an American institution enjoyed by all of the family.
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Mckinley Station,
County "Ghost-town"
In southwest Washington County today, a big, square frame building that was once a hotel, is the only reminder of Mckinley Station. If Alfred Hitch- cock saw the old hotel today, no doubt he would use it as a setting for some bizarre murder mystery to be filmed. It would serve very well, for it does have a ghostly, bizarre appearance and a crimson past.
Mckinley Station started as a dairy venture, about 1894. The farm itself was a large tract, well over a thousand acres. There were four large cattle barns, and a creamery that stood west of the hotel.
The hotel had fourteen rooms, and catered to city people who wanted a rural weekend. The M .- I. Rail- road stopped at a crossing just south of the hotel, which gave the place its name. People who came to the hotel had saddle horses to ride, and indulged in var- ious rural activities. As many as 100 cows were milked here. There was also a general store.
But the entire venture was ill-fated financially and discontinued about 1904 or 1905.
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Washington County does not have a bonafide ghost town, but this old hotel at Mckinley Station is reminis- cent of a failure in a previous generation.
Today, all that remains of the venture is the old hotel, a lone sentinel on the prairie, alongside the M .- I. tracks, southwest of Oakdale.
Negro Slave Burials in Washington County
Today, there are still two spots within Washing- ton County borders, attesting to a long-past Negro population. On a county road about four and one-half miles East of DuBois. a single gravestone reposes on a knoll, shaded by two large trees, a mute reminder that once this was a cemetery. The dimly-etched name on the stone is that of Henry Lewis. Lewis was a Negro, a freed slave. one of several farm families who settled in this part of Washington County about the time of the Civil War's windup. or perhaps even a few years later. Once this hilltop cemetery contained about twenty marked graves, all Negro, but time has almost leveled the scene to the original terrain.
About a mile Northwest of DuBois, alongside highway 51, there is a second Negro burial, a man named Isaac Umphries, at Chapel Hill cemetery there.
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